cairns

While exploring how poetry expresses things far beyond the literal words I ran across this masterpiece by Bob Dylan.

Red River Shore

Some of us turn off the lights and we live
In the moonlight shooting by
Some of us scare ourselves to death in the dark
To be where the angels fly
Pretty maids all in a row lined up
Outside my cabin door
I’ve never wanted any of them wanting me
‘Cept the girl from the Red River shore

Well, I sat by her side and for a while I tried
To make that girl my wife
She gave me her best advice and she said
“Go home and lead a quiet life.”
Well, I’ve been to the east and I’ve been to the west
And I’ve been out where the black winds roar
Somehow, though, I never did get that far
With the girl from the Red River shore

Well, I knew when I first laid eyes on her
I could never be free
One look at her and I knew right away
She should always be with me
Well, the dream dried up a long time ago
Don’t know where it is anymore
True to life, true to me
Was the girl from the Red River shore

Now I’m wearing the cloak of misery
And I’ve tasted jilted love
And the frozen smile upon my face
Fits me like a glove
But I can’t escape from the memory
Of the one that I’ll always adore
All those nights when I lay in the arms
Of the girl from the Red River shore

Well, we’re living in the shadows of a fading past
Trapped in the fires of time
I’ve tried not to ever hurt anybody
And to stay out of a life of crime
And when it’s all been said and done
I never did know the score
One more day is another day away
From the girl from the Red River shore

Well, I’m a stranger here in a strange land
But I know this is where I belong
I’ll ramble and gamble for the one I love
And the hills will give me a song
Though nothing looks familiar to me
I know I’ve stayed here before
Once, a thousand nights ago
With the girl from the Red River shore

Well, I went back to see about it once
Went back to straighten it out
Everybody that I talked to had seen us there
Said they didn’t know who I was talking about
Well, the sun went down on me a long time ago
I’ve had to fall back from the door
I wish I could have spent every hour of my life
With the girl from the Red River shore

Now, I’ve heard of a guy who lived a long time ago
A man full of sorrow and strife
Whenever someone around him died and was dead
He knew how to bring ‘em on back to life
Well, I don’t know what kind of language he used
Or if they do that kind of thing anymore
Sometimes I think nobody ever saw me here at all
‘Cept the girl from the Red River shore

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These three pictures were taken on a mountain top in China in 2009 under the slimmest  sliver of a moon showing in the first picture.  The second picture shows the way down with no flash turned on, and the last is the same view with a flash.  I know the camera stays open longer without a flash, but they still make a point to me, that I wanted to share.

It was dark up there!  But the middle picture shows that the easiest way down was using the available natural light.  With it we could see the entire area.  The last is the effect of a man made light — everything very close is completely lit and the rest of the world is invisible.  Many who have spent time away from cities know this trick of travel.

But, it takes me back to what I wrote last.  It sounds great to say the light is obvious when the situation is dark.  But life often just does not seem that way.  Dark times are dark or we would not call them that!  This is one of the places where “feel good” theology leaves people in touch with life’s realities  assuming we do not have a clue what we are talking about!  They know when it is dark no matter what we say!

But, I think there is a corollary that makes sense. When we cannot see past a few feet, perhaps we are using too much of our own light.  Better to stand still, remain open, and become aware of the Light that surrounds us.

peace

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Never accept and be content with unanalyzed assumptions, assumptions about the work, about the people, about the church or Christianity.  Never be afraid to ask questions about the work we have inherited or the work we are doing.  There is no question that should not be asked or that is outlawed.  The day we are completely satisfied with what we have been doing; the day we have found the perfect, unchangeable system of work, the perfect answer, never in need of being corrected again, on that day we will know that we are wrong, that we have made the greatest mistake of all.

Vincent Donovan, as quoted in Brian McLaren’s A new Kind of Christianity: Ten Questions that are Transforming the Faith.

This is going to be an interesting book!   peace

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I was meeting with my Masters students today and as we were finishing devotions we started sharing prayer concerns.  Several students shared situations were people were dealing with the loss caused by sudden deaths.  One had mused about the strength of one of the people involved to be able to declare even in the pain that, “God is good.”  We continued sharing and were talking about how families need our prayers, but also our presence for the long haul including knowing that you still remember their loved one, and a sharp visual image hit me which I shared with them.

So often in times of grief we go numbly through passages like Psalm 23.  We read words about passing through the “Valley of the Shadow” and we picture ourselves having strength to survive dark, desperate, frightening places.  But, we claim to live in the presence of the Light!  We claim to have a loving relationship with the Light that will not leave us or forsake us.  If you put the two together a whole new image appears.  When you have light, the darker the surroundings get the brighter your light appears.  Ever seen a match in a cave?

This has been a hard two years.  It has been a hard summer.  But, this image was powerfully healing.  Last school year with physical pain, and personal loss to endure, an important part of that light was my precious group of fourth graders at Hebron, but its source was even deeper.  When a believer walks through dark places, the Light is blazing.  It is time to notice and live.

peace

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Several things I have been reading lately caused me to check God’s first and last commands.  According to the narrative as we have it, God’s first command is not to obey or abstain, to toil or to behave in certain ways.  God’s first command to man, and all of creation is to be, period, to have life.  Then God enjoys fellowship with them.

Leaving alone for a moment all the things we muddle up in the middle, I turn to the final command.  Again it is none of the things we usually preach and teach.  It is also to come and share life.  To once again live in fellowship with creation and Creator.  Walter Brueggemann points out that one of the most obvious and overlooked predictions in the strange book of Revelation is that at the final full restoration of the Kingdom they are singing.  They are singing and God is saying, “Come in and share life with Me.”

Jesus said, “I have come that they may have life and life to the full!” And Jesus did NOT say we would only get the life God intends after a long life of woeful obedience to dogma when we finally die.  Jesus said that the Kingdom is here.   The church has long maintained that the Kingdom exists on Earth post-Easter.  If we believe it, really believe it, then I think these are the preeminent commands we should be declaring and living now!  And we have given them far too little attention!

In a world where people find the goodness of creation sullied by death, fear, uncertainty, and environmental destruction we have responded too long with platitudes and to do lists (mostly involving supporting the life of the corporate church!), dogma and damnation.  It is time to echo God’s primary commands.  Come and live!

Revelation 22:¹⁷The Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” And let him who hears say, “Come!” Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.”

Come, love, sing, live.

peace

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We had a nice soaking rain this evening.  Just enough at our house to revive the lawn.

Further into the city where my daughter lives it was more of a problem.  The pavement is above the drains so that they sit down in a hole at the side of the street and clog easily.  My daughter messaged that her husband was at work and she was in the basement bailing water hoping “they” cleared the street drains soon.  Knowing full well that the only “they” is “us,” I took off with a pump for her basement and a heavy rake.  (The rest may sound like bragging about everyday events if I don’t tell you I had selfish motives.  I didn’t want my pregnant daughter bailing dirty water; I didn’t want her things ruined; I didn’t want my granddaughter worried or playing in dirty water; I didn’t want to pay for new things either! Confession done.)

Neighbors a block from her house were trying to stop all traffic from going into the water, but didn’t seem to have much idea what else to do except wait for “the fire department to set up some saw horses or something.”  Got the pump to my daughter and waded down to the corner of her street.  There was one man already there with the drains freed up some.  So, I helped him get all four opened and headed down to the first group of people and started opening their drains.  Had a nice conversation with a young couple standing out watching the water and lamenting the soaking of the decorating they had just done in their downstairs.  The lights honestly seemed to go on as she turned to him and said, “We could do that next time!”  Got them going and went a block the other way to help folks there already working to clear their debris.

Soon the streets were clearing and I headed back toward my wonderful 96 Toyota pickup (water was too deep to reach my daughter’s house without it!) to head home.  Got stopped by a guy begging for a jump.  With obvious alcohol breath he told me he never even saw the water and now his car wouldn’t restart.  He was asking in a way that made it clear he expected to be rebuffed.  I told him it was OK, I would help him as much as I could; said good night to my daughter and headed back his way.  Of course his problem was water not a dead battery, but we tried until he was convinced he had to wait for it to dry out.  Helped him get his car out of the way and locked and gave him a ride home.

On the way he started telling me about how hard things are, working trying to make it, finally got this car on payments, then this.  He asked me, “So, why do these things happen to me?”

There was a time when I might have moralized about drinking and driving and how accidentally baptizing your car is one of the least horrific results a person might expect.  There was a time when I would have felt compelled to tell him about Jesus.  Tonight, I realized he just needed to know that good exists.  So, I simply reminded him that’s why we help each other when we are not the one with the problem.  He affirmed that he believed and practiced that too and that it was important to take care of each other, but still offered to pay me the couple of dollars he had.

I have friends who are experts at having convincing conversations with people about faith in almost every situation.  Tonight, I knew talking about Jesus would ruin the community of people just helping other people.  I wouldn’t be one of the several people helping each other the best they knew how.  I would be some guy taking advantage of misfortune to sell my beliefs.  That wasn’t what any of us needed.  We needed to just be neighbors.  This fellow just needed affirmation that good does happen when we remember to look out for each other.  That was enough, and his handshake when he left was of far more value than his dollars or a notch on my conversions gun!

We shared a little kingdom time in the rain, and it was good.

peace

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Whatever happened to sacraments?  Was it just the desire of Protestants to never sound Catholic that removed them from our lives?  Or was it more?  Was it the poison of modernity telling us that observable acts are what they appear to be and nothing more?  In fact late-modern science has taught us that they may be less because various observers cannot agree on even the exact nature of the physical act.  Perhaps it was the Age of Reason which led us rushing to a world which never spoke of magic or anything which might be considered ignorant and superstitious. Perhaps a lingering Gnostic heresy causes us to refuse to believe that bread and wine can be body and blood because we find the physical repulsive and separated from the spiritual.

But, somewhere along the line many of us lost the presence of sacrament in our lives.  According to Brueggemann, sacrament is “an invisible act wrought through a visible sign.”  How can we have sacrament when we live our lives by the rules of objectivity, even if we voice other beliefs when pressed?  And lately it has weighed on me more and more that we do not have the courage to speak of the glorious magical mystery of God’s unseen acts even when enacting the most basic practices of the church.

The elements of Holy Communion are held up and in my last place of worship consistently referred to as “emblems.”  No danger of Catholic theology of the literal body and blood there!  And, no power to save either.  What do the faithful understand to be happening when they eat small “emblems?”  What sense does it make, what power to transform does it bring to them — let alone the uninitiated seeker who still wanders in the door?

Baptism becomes “an act of crucial obedience” in order for the church to maintain its position that such an act must be performed, and at the same time avoid accusations of saying we are saved because of our acts rather than God’s.  What strange god is this who dies to find me, but demands that I be dipped in a fancy hot tub, or in places with less funds a decorated watering trough, to demonstrate that I am obedient enough for his love?  Why does he settle for my obedience to take a bath, but not demand my obedience to the more radical and subversive commands of Jesus?  What sense does this act have, and what transformation does it bring?

I hold that these acts are indeed sacraments, visible signs of very real but unobservable divine acts.  To argue about the exact nature of the bread and wine as they reach my lips is to fall into the trap of modern thought that an object can only be one thing and not two.  But, faith proclaims it to be true.  Jesus said they were His Body and Blood.  His Body and His Blood are the reality of the God who stops at absolutely nothing in order to bring about the redemption of creation.  I do not have the courage to call it less than Holy.  There is more going on in these moments than symbols invoking memory!  I come unworthy and undeserving to the alter of grace and participate in the redemption of all that is — including myself.

If baptism is nothing but proof of obedience, it is a silly ritual at best — better to ask the new believer to sell their earthly goods and give to the poor in obedience!  I embrace the belief that it also is a sacrament — that the alienated self is buried in the waters and the new self truly raised to live in the post-Easter Kingdom.  The properly instructed recipient experiences this transformation.  The properly led gathering of believers witnesses the miracle of rebirth.  To be clear, I agree that there is submission involved — the baptized have surrendered the humanistic hope of redeeming creation by human effort and agreed to die unto self and be raised into Christ.  At least, if the church dares to declare holy mystery, they do.

I believe that marriage is holy because the two become one in the unseen realm of the divine, not just in the state record books.  I believe that life is holy because the text tells me it was created by the speech and breath of God.  While I would not label conception as a sacrament, (it is always unseen under natural conditions), the text declares that the sacrament of marriage is the intended precursor to this creation of a new life.  God intends for life to be nurtured and has made it observable not only in human families, but in the animal kingdom as well.

There is no logical, scientific, objective speech for the same person dying and being reborn into a new holy kingdom.  Neither is there expression for receiving into my physical being the eternal gift of that deadly day we dare to call Good.  The every day life that surrounds us is shot through with Glory. Jesus declared that the Kingdom is all about us.  But, we have insufficient language to comprehend or share it.  Perhaps it is time again to live the poetry of sacraments which make the invisible tangible and unite us in praise and gratitude.

peace

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Today a group of citizens sent notice to the occupying empire. ‘Protecting us from local tribes and foreign instigators does not give you the right to maintain a military presence among us forever.  You must leave.  We claim the rights of self-governance and sovereignty.’  And the US was born.  Am I the only one who sees some irony here?

Then they declared that we have freedom of speech.  But, I did not post this to FB in order to avoid the Southern Indiana furor which would result.  The government still will not come and arrest me for saying it.  But, we have given our freedom over to whatever version of thought is currently considered politically correct and a total lack of civility during disagreements in public discourse.  That is a painful irony!

peace

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Friday morning I drove East through fog into the rising sun.  The air was a golden mist more real than the phantom possibility of trees and hillsides beyond.  Then, gradually, the light grew.  The mist became water for very real green hillsides and woodlands under blue sky and bright sun.  It is a divine gift to watch the world come to be.  peace

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I just hate it when pastors say things that are untrue about God and contrary to the overwhelming evidence of scripture.  Yesterday I heard a local pastor give a mostly very good message about the role of the church in reaching out to others.  But, as he talked about the obstacles to actually getting up and doing something, he repeatedly said that we are not allowed to question God.  Of course, I know his denomination all too well.  They believe God speaks to the body through the staff and elders and what they really mean is, “Do not question what we tell you.”  That is bad enough in my book, but that is not what he said.  He said, “Do not question God.”

The most basic perusal of the Bible narratives will show that this is an unsupported view.  They all questioned God.  Abraham, Moses, Job, the psalmists, the prophets and kings, the disciples, Ananias, (and now us.) The problem is not in asking questions.  The problem comes into the narrative when people do not pay attention to the presence of God at all, or refuse to obey the answers they are given.

People have questions, especially if called to live outside the norms of their own cultural narrative.  Who are they supposed to ask?

Themselves to see if it fits into what their own culture deems normal or acceptable?  That is contrary to the Biblical accounts and leads to inaction — or action that only supports the direction their culture is already traveling.

Their neighbor? I have no problem with this one if the neighbor is a mature person who can help with discernment.  But, it often leads to gossip, doubting, and undermining of valid decisions by church leadership.

God?  I do understand the problem the pastor was getting at here.  We ask our questions through inaction and rationalization.  We talk to the ceiling not truly believing that God has or will speak, and are answered only by our own norms and fears.  Then we fail to live lives of adventure and service.  Or, we word it so that we appear to be questioning (humbly because we are so ‘virtuous’) our own skills, talents, or ‘calling.’  But, we are letting ourselves off the hook of doing and being what we are called to do and be.

No, I think honestly questioning God is exactly what we ARE supposed to do.  Then we are to listen for the answer and obey.  Ananias (called to go cure and witness to Saul of Tarsus) was the example used in yesterday’s text.  Question God is exactly what the text says he did.  It does not indicate that God is offended.  It indicates that God gave a clear emphatic, also read unmistakable, answer.  He went, and the history of Christianity changed.  I see no problem with the asking.  The obedience to the answer is everything.

Even for the pastor giving the sermon, within his “we tell you what God says” framework, would be better off to invite folks being called to do something new TO ask their honest questions of the leadership that claims to speak for God.  If they really are delivering a message true to divine intention, they will have the answers and be able to support their followers into action.

The alternative is well known to anyone who has studied leadership.  If they do not ask you, they will ask somebody else and undercurrents will form.  (I know the military, under the possibility of orders given in battle conditions, does not use this model.  But, they are not the scriptural model and most of life’s situations do not match theirs.)  Or, people will lie awake at night questioning themselves, their faith, their worthiness because they have questions for God and their pastor has told them it is forbidden.  They just will not be free to ask for help, because that would label them as spiritually unfit instead of human like every hero in the Biblical narratives.

The same pastor, in the same sermon, was talking about inviting people into a relationship with God.  What kind of relationship, other than dictatorial, allows for only commands and obedience without questions?  Certainly a relationship with a loving God cannot mimic those demeaning human behaviors.  Relationships call for honesty.  When one party has questions, they should be asked.  Then answers should be carefully heard.

THAT is what the heroes of the scriptural texts DO.  They hear and see, they question, they listen, and they obey.  There is nothing evil or forbidden in that pattern.

peace

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